Loss of VoIP in Qatar

Posts: 16 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Dec 11, 2005 Posts: 16

Do you know of any utilities that we can run ourselves to check what qtel has banned?
These guys are full of lies and excuses. Lets us find what is going on,
I did run netcheck that i got from [ADMIN EDIT: LINKS TO OTHER VOIP COMPANIES ARE NOT ALLOWED]
It seems that ports 5060 5082 are blocked. But we need a tool to do an extensive analysis and see what QTEL has banned. and then to communicate that to Vonnage and the other VOIPS for solutions. ANY ideas??

Posts: 39 · Posted: Mon Dec 12, 2005 10:37 am Post subject: Loss of VOIP in Qatar

I have three different types of letters to the American Ambassador in Qatar for any one to use and modify. Please email me at fightqtel@gmail.com and I will email them to you. Let us keep the pressure on the Embassy, and maybe they can start a political solution.

Thanks,

Posts: 24 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Dec 02, 2004 Posts: 24

bmardini wrote:

Hell, the US has signed a 50-year agreement to defend Qatar, American companies are building up Qatar, and this is the way they pay us back.

My friend,
Which world are you living in? US defence companies and other US companies involved in rebuilding Qatar (or any nation, incl Iraq) make billions in doing so (point in case - Haliburton, Bechtel). Even Uncle Sam profits from the "50-year agreement to defend Qatar", because basically Qatar provides us a crucial friendly military base in the troubled middle-east.
Do not be under any illusions that anybody involved in this is doing it out of charity. Money rules, and is still the king!

Posts: 1 · New Forum Member Joined: Dec 12, 2005 Posts: 1

well, probably the problem is not with americans calling home from time to time but in fact internet cafes and other people generally from the indina subcontinent which use VoIP, skype etc as a business enterprise. Hundeds of people go to these places every day and this is probably why Qtel has banned it.

but as they cannot distinguish they have to ban all IP addresses. Maybe a solution might be to get a letter from embassy to request a particular IP address to be opened up to VoIP as these will be the people that would not abuse most likely???

I can not see it being banned totally though, unless qtel reduce rates to india, pakistan are reduced so that these business are not competitive any more but this will take a huge shift of Qtel strategy which is highly unlikely

There might be might a chance for it to not banned since Qtel is banning on financial grounds, the terms and conditions can only ban certain sites / ports on cultural reasons e.g. inappriate content. Maybe the best solution is to unban all; and then prosecute people who abuse system???

Posts: 12 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Dec 10, 2005 Posts: 12

Interesting. If the terms and conditions do state that, it is definitely grounds for a Shari'a court case. If we fail to achieve any results through complaints, suggestions, and the Embassy; I am thinking about filing suit with the Shari'a court. The owner is Muslim, as am I, which makes this breach of Islamic contract law a case for these particular settlement courts. Islamic law is very clear about the rulings of business contracts. I think it is also to our benefit that many of the judges in these courts are not Qatari or Wahhabi-oriented in their jurisprudence. We shall see. But we should definitely explore the other avenues first.

What is the e-mail address of the Emabassy by the way?

Posts: 16 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Dec 11, 2005 Posts: 16

Wake up fokes. The same family rules the country for 30 years.
for anyone living in the area. The style of ruling is obvious. The faster we work a solution to bypass the system, the easier will be.
Qatar does not understand pressure!! especially from Americans. They are Arabs?Remember?

Posts: 22 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Dec 11, 2005 Posts: 22

Quote:

If the terms and conditions do state that, it is definitely grounds for a Shari'a court case

This is depressing folks, some look at the issue politically, some look at it emotionally, I look at as pure business.

We all signed the QtTel Terms of Services (TOS), when we wanted the phone line and other services. You take that to any court and it will be used against you for not complying with this or that.

Skype stopped working as well Brick wall

Posts: 11 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Dec 09, 2005 Posts: 11

A number of fellow contractors at my location have also lost their service with Packet 8. Although a competitor with Vonage, perhaps everyone involved can also put their heads together and come up with a possible solution?

I've looked into VPN services, and aside from utilizing a managed VPN service, a cost-effective means may be difficult, if not impossible. I have reports that an individual at our location who manages his own suite of servers Stateside with VPN was also unsuccessful in getting his VoIP through.

And even trying to go through VPN, softphone would do nothing but continuously time out.

I'm not about to give up quite yet, but I do think at the end of the month, I may, regretfully, end up cancelling my Vonage service.

If Q-Tel could only be convinced to provide VoIP access through an additional subscription-based solution, otherwise I fear we're stuck.

Posts: 11 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Dec 09, 2005 Posts: 11

Just saw this when checking the forums at experts-exchange.com.

The ports for Vonage:

SIP ports 5060 through 5061 UDP
NTP port 123 UDP
TFTP port 69 UDP
DNS port 53 UDP
RTP ports 10,000 through 20,000 UDP

Posts: 2135 · Posted: Tue Dec 13, 2005 3:29 am Post subject:

dconnor wrote:

Kardelen wrote:

Funny you have not seen anything in the Newspapers or on the Qtel site. Guess I need to send a few messages out.

What we have seen here in the past regarding similar issues such as the vonage-forum.com/ftopic4184.html" rel="nofollow" target="_blank" class="postlink">TelMex Blocking VoIP in Mexico problem is some of the more high profile VoIP Bloggers pick-up on the story via our vonage-forum.com/syndication.html" rel="nofollow" target="_blank" class="postlink">RSS Feeds and write about it, which tends to lead to the international press picking up on it.

In fact, Ted Wallingford has already posted "Vonage customers stymied in Qatar" in his well respected blog, The VoIP Weblog.

One of the most respected VoIP journalist, Russell Shaw from ZDNet; has reported on this issue in this blog post entitled: Is Qatar blocking VoIP calls? Vonage users may complain to American Embassy